Careful With That Ax

The main work on this disk of music from John Adams is Century Rolls, which is a piano concerto in all but name. It was written for the soloist here, Emanuel Ax, and the Cleveland Orchestra conducted by Christoph von Dohnanyi. Adams states that the inspiration was from early 20th century piano rolls, hence the title he has given it. Nancarrow is an obvious further inspiration but there is a very strong jazz feel also and Ax is fully at home in the idiom. The whole makes for a most entertaining piece with a ravishing slow movement. The entire disk sums up the audience friendly face of contemporary music that Adams embodies. There are two further items, orchestral showpieces played here by the Halle Orchestra under Kent Nagano. Lollapalooza was written for Simon Rattle and is a brassy piece which again contains references to jazz and to the tradition of Bernstein. The final piece is Slonimsky's Earbox, dedicated to Nicholas Slonimsky a Russian author of several witty books on music. One of his notable books covered scales and modes and these are explored by Adams in this piece.